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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28998057">Poine</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/nonbinaryezrabridger/pseuds/nonbinaryezrabridger'>nonbinaryezrabridger</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Old Guard (Movie 2020)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst, Blood, Canon-Typical Violence, Character Study, Don't copy to other sites, F/F, Grief/Mourning, Implied/Referenced Torture, Mentioned Quynh | Noriko, Possible Blasphemy?, Religious Imagery &amp; Symbolism, is murder a valid trauma coping mechanisim discuss, see notes for complete tw</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-01-26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-01-26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 10:54:34</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Graphic Depictions Of Violence</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>3,862</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28998057</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/nonbinaryezrabridger/pseuds/nonbinaryezrabridger</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>“For there is no such thing as justice<br/>All the best that we can hope for is revenge.”<br/>- Fight like a girl, Emilie Autumn</p>
<p>[or, the backstory of how Andromache escapes the witch trials after the loss of Quynh]</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Andy | Andromache of Scythia/Quynh | Noriko</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>13</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Poine</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>my first old guard fanfic and it's...interesting. It's dark but also I think it retains the message of the movie so hopefully it's an accurate portrayal. I also really feel like Andy's hatred of a christian God makes sense considering the whole witch trials thing was no doubt seeped in Christianity. I don't intend this fic to be offensive to Christians but who knows. </p>
<p>Also if my tags aren't clear, quynh doesn't actually appear in this fic, she is only mentioned.</p>
<p>The title has a meaning too: Poine (also poena) is a greek word for a spirit of punishment. </p>
<p>I hope you enjoy!</p>
<p>Tw: blood, graphic descriptions of death (including death by starvation, hanging, and burning at the stake), graphic descriptions of violence,  slight gore. All a canon typical amount of death and violence.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>-----------</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>Andromache wonders if it had been a simple mistake. </span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>Or perhaps someone had finally taken pity on her, after months--or was it years?---of torture.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>Either way, the keys had fallen out of the guard’s pocket after he had locked her into her shackles. They had landed softly in the sparse hay covering the cell’s floor and, though they were a grimy metal that couldn’t shine, to Andromache they look beautiful. It’s as if they are beckoning her forwards, almost glowing with the promise of freedom.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>Andromache has to stretch to her body’s full length, added to the length of the shackles, to reach the keys with her toes. Her toes are not as agile as her fingers, but she manages to hook one through the loop of keys. She drags it towards her and it scrapes lightly, but not loudly enough to alert the guards outside the door. Finally her fingers meet metal and she begins to unshackle herself. Her hands don’t shake despite how little they feed her. They had completely stopped feeding her at one point, as if seeing what would happen, and she had taken weeks to die. When she came gasping back to life it was with one of the guards staring at her, as if hoping she had died for good. She wonders if they’re as tired of the torture as she is. But once he saw she had revived, just like always, he begrudgingly began spooning porridge into her mouth. She had taken the food; there was no point starving herself if there was no final freedom of death at the end.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>With the help of the key, the shackles come off her wrists easily. Her wrists have become callused from wearing the chains for so long; at first they had bruised and bled, but no longer. She stares down at the tough skin, trying not to loathe that they left permanent marks on her. She shakes herself out of the self hatred and gives the chains an experimental yank. The chains would be a more effective weapon than her bare hands, but they’re too firmly attached to the wall. Of course they are; if they weren’t she could have escaped without the keys.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>As she makes the move to walk barefoot across the cell, keeping her footsteps silent, she thinks to herself: </span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>If a person had helped free her, she doesn’t know who it was. If they had been hoping she would flee as soon as she was free---like a mortally wounded animal---they were very wrong. She intends to take a Shakespearean pound of flesh. She will make every single one of the tormentors pay in blood. Not for herself; her pain was unimportant in comparison to the loss of Quynh. It had taken months after they had first kissed for Andromache to call her wife; despite it being the proper word, she still felt the shame society had pressed into her. But all that---the love as well as the shame---have been lost in this cell. Now there is only the animal desperation, like a rat backed into a corner. </span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>If Andromache had once been civilized, they had driven it from her. There will be no mercy from her, just as her captors had none upon her or Quynh.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>Andromache crouches, gathering her strength, and then stands tall in the corner of the cell which is blocked from the guard’s view when the door is opened. She cries out, making it sound as broken as possible:</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“I want to repent. Please, bring the priest, I want my soul to be saved!”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>The door creaks open and the guard notices the empty shackles almost instantly, but even that is too late. Andromache leaps and, with a strength born from desperation and years of training, throws the door open. The guard is just beginning to call out as Andromache crushes his windpipe. The sound of his body hitting the floor alerts the other guard stationed outside the cell, but Andromache is already in motion. She is out of the cell and on him before he can even process what he heard. She covers his mouth with a hand before he can cry out and drags him, thrashing and kicking, back into the cell. </span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>She pins him down, careful not to injure him yet, and hisses wildly into his face:</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“Where is the other witch who cannot die? Where did you take her?”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>The man whimpers and struggles for a moment before saying:</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“I don’t know, only the mayor does.”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>Andromache grins at him, the expression joyless and promising a coming explosion of violence, and asks:</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“And where is the mayor?”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>The guard is sweating, afraid deep in his bones, knowing that she has very little time to waste.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“The center of town, at the church.”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>Andromache snarls:</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“Not surprising. He calls himself a man of God. We will see if that will save him.”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>She snaps the guard’s neck with ease. She rises from the corpse and then creeps out of the cell. She leaves a trail of bodies throughout the small prison before sneaking out the back door. She stops for a moment as the cool air hits her face for the first time in so long. She breathes in the scent of an oncoming storm and smiles, a real smile, but a small, weak one. Then she continues to run behind a row of houses, heading for the church which is marked by a large wooden cross at its apex. As she’s making her way through the back alley, she spots a flattened tree trunk, used as a base to chop wood, and left there, a hatchet. She wonders which man’s misfortune this is, to be so perfectly placed for her to find.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>She greets the hatchet like an old friend, the handle familiar in her hand, the heft of its weight easy despite the physical abuse she has suffered. It’s not her axe, but it’s a passable weapon.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>She’s halfway to the church when a cry goes up from the prison:</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“The witch! She’s escaped!”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>The bodies have been discovered; she knew they would be. She continues on her way and reaches the end of the row of houses. As she comes around the corner, so does a man. He looks startled, holding a pile of farming implements in his arms. Andromache has seen him maybe once or twice; he never participated in the torture but he had been in the front row when they watched her and Quynh hang. He was a man of some power and prestige in this town. So she doesn’t hesitate as she swings the hatchet into his chest. He goes down and she shakes the hatchet off, removing most of the blood on the blade. She leaves him there to finish dying, quiet and out of sight.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>She makes it to the church and slips inside; her prey is there. The mayor turns as she enters and freezes in place. She gives him the same vicious smile she gave the guard in the cell. The mayor instinctively moves for his waist, but he’s not wearing a gun or a knife on his belt. Andromache steps into striking range and sees the recognition in his eyes: he can’t call for help, or run, before she can kill him with a single strike. He’s at her mercy. She rests the hatchet blade on his shoulder, lightly pressing against the vulnerable spot where his shoulder meets his neck. The few remaining drops of blood on the blade soak into the shirt he’s wearing, marring his expensive clothes. He breathes shakily and watches Andromache, not speaking, just waiting. Andormache knows she doesn’t have long before the town raises arms and begins looking for her, but she’s going to take the time to do this.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>She speaks evenly, calmly, as if they were simply sharing a meal together:</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“Do you even know what you discovered?”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>He looks scornful as he says:</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“You are the most powerful witch I’ve ever seen, but God will strike you down.”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>Andromache laughs, a wicked cackle, and replies:</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“Is your mind that small? All you can see in me is a witch?”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>He just glares. She chuckles and looks down for a moment, gathering her thoughts before saying:</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“I have lived so many years, killed more men than you can count. I am not a witch; I am much more. I am a force of nature. I am a monster from a world older than your civilization. Perhaps you would understand the greek term better: I was called Nemesis, the goddess of divine retribution. I put those arrogant enough to think they are equal to gods back into their place.”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>The mayor finally looks angry and he snaps:</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“You would call yourself equal to our lord God?”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>Andromache sighs, tightening her grip on the hatchet.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“I don’t call myself a god. I prefer to be a person. But you took that from me. You locked me up like an animal, tortured me without regret, removed my wife from my side.”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>The mayor’s eyes gleam then, as if he’s recognized a weak spot. He says slyly:</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“That’s why you’re here. You care about the other witch.”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>Andromache speaks without hesitation, her voice clear and unfaltering like a rung bell:</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“More than you could ever know.”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>The mayor moves slowly, pressing his hand to the desk of papers he had been standing by, lit dimly by the flickering flame of a small oil lamp. He says:</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“I hired the sailors in the town where I took out a boat. We threw her into the sea, may her soul be damned, just as your will be.”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>Andromache snarls:</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“Stop your preaching and tell me where.”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>The mayor says calmly:</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“The notes recording the location are all in this desk.”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>Then he moves, and Andromache is already jumping back to protect herself from his attack, but he doesn’t lunge for her. He smashes the lamp over the desk, the oil spilling over the vulnerable papers and quickly catching flame. He screams victoriously:</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“She will rot for eternity, and soon you will join her!”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>Andromache screams as if he had thrown the hot oil on her skin instead and buries the hatchet in his neck. She ignores his sputtering death throes and runs to the desk, dropping the hatchet and trying to pat out the flame with her bare hands. But the paper is the perfect fuel and the fire is already spreading to the polished wood of the desk itself. Andromache tries to dig through the drawers before the fire can get to them, but only succeeds in covering her hands in burns. The desk is quickly consumed by a pillar of flame, destroying everything within it.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>She falls to her knees, cradling her injured arms to her chest, and sobs. Before her hands can even heal, she is tearing at her long tangled hair, trying to pull herself to pieces in a storm of self hatred and despair. The mayor breathes his last breath at her side, and his blood soaks into her dirty slip of a dress. She shrieks again, so loudly she feels her throat should tear with the sound, and smashes the mayor’s nose in. She hits him again and again until he’s a bloody mess, but he is already gone. She can’t undo the damage he had done, can’t even hurt him anymore.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>Finally she is pulled from her grief by the fire spreading from the wooden desk to the pews, crawling up the church’s walls like some destructive, hungry creature. The smoke is already gathering in heavy, dark clouds and she struggles to breathe. For a moment she considers staying there, dying in the fire over and over again until they dig her body out of the ashes and throw her back into the cell. The pain they can submit her to feels like nothing compared to having to live without Quynh.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>The only thing that makes her rise from her slump is that there are still people who did this to Quynh who haven’t suffered yet. So she grips the handle of the hatchet like it can hold her shattered self together and stands slowly. She walks over embers falling from the burning ceiling in her bare feet, breathes in so much smoke she can feel her insides ache as they try to heal, and she emerges from the fire burning with righteous rage.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>A few men have rallied outside the church, pointing rifles at her as she steps out of the building. They hesitate, seemingly aware that their bullets can only stop her for so long. Then someone shouts an order and they fire. Andromache was already running, making for the cover of the next row of houses. One man stands between her and their shelter. She swings out with the handle of the hatchet, taking him out the knee, and hooks a hand into his coat collar and drags him with her. A second before she’s behind the wall of the closest house, a bullet buries itself in her shoulder. As she flees the men struggle to reload their guns, which is a lengthy and difficult process. The technology of the day is inefficient. </span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>She barely feels the bullet in her shoulder, shaking off the pain to take the gun from the hands of the man she’s dragging with her. She throws the rifle down out of his reach, clattering against the ground. The man is busy grasping at the knee she had smashed, and barely even notices the loss of his only weapon. Andromache flips the hatchet around, once again gripping the handle, and positions the blade over his closest hand. She growls with all the hatred coursing through her body:</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“You will tell me where Margret and Florence live, or I will begin chopping pieces off of you.”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>The man begins to blubber, but rushes to tell her which house. She rewards him with as quick a death as possible with her improvised weapon before once again moving forwards. She is a hunter stalking her prey; she already has the scent, it’s only a matter of time. This will be different than her previous kills; the men will be out with their weapons, attempting to defend their families and hunt the witch down. The women will be hiding indoors, trying to keep the children quiet and safe.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>Andromache doesn’t run into any more men on the way to the house, as many of them are distracted from hunting the witch by trying to keep the fire from spreading from the church to the nearby houses. The whole town could go up if the sparks aren’t stopped. Andromache wouldn’t mind; for all their talk of hellfire, let them see how they enjoy the fire devouring their bodies and livelihoods. They had burned Andromache at the stake many times; it seems a proper vengeance.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>Andromache makes it to the house the captured man had told her about; it is unguarded. She climbs the single step up and pulls at the front door, feeling that it is locked. That is unsurprising, the women would have put up at least that line of defense. Andromache carefully lines up the hatchet and smashes it into the wood where the locking mechanism is most likely to be. After a couple blows, the wood begins to splinter. A few more and there is a growing hole in the door. Andromache reaches a hand through and undoes the lock easily. They should have attempted to barricade the door with something, perhaps heavy wood furniture. Not that it would have stopped her, but it would have made the hunt more difficult. Perhaps they didn’t realize the true extent of the danger they were in.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>None of that matters now; Andromache is inside the house. She listens carefully as she stands in the entryway, and soon she is rewarded with the muffled complaint of a child coming from upstairs. As she climbs the stairs a door closes above and a whisper of conversation starts. Andromache reaches the top and steps into the hallway, just as a woman in a white dress comes out of a nearby room. The woman stops suddenly, spotting Andromache and the hatchet in her hand.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>The woman screams and turns to flee back into the room she came from, trying to shut the door before Andromache can reach her. She isn’t fast enough or strong enough; Andromache grabs the edge of the door and pushes hard, throwing it open and knocking the woman back.  There is a second woman in the room who also screams and tries to help her friend back to her feet. Andromache enters the room, taking in it’s sparse decoration which, of course, includes a cross on the wall. But mostly she stays focused on the women cowering in front of her. She settles into a broad stance, hatchet hanging loose but ready at her side, and says:</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“Do remember when you first saw me?”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>One of the girls, the one with dark hair, so that must be Margret, gasps out:</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“You were helping the witches. You were trying to free them.”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>Andromache nods and says:</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“I imagine quite a few of them were condemned by your testimony, as were Quynh and I.”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>Florence, the one with blonde hair, finally regains her speech and says:</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“You can’t deny being a witch! I’ve watched you die a thousand times. Only the devil could keep you alive for so long, to complete your mission to spread evil throughout our world.”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>Andromache sighs, pressing the hand not holding the hatchet to her forehead. She says tiredly:</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“You see something you don’t understand, so it must be the devil. For what reasons did you accuse those other women? None of them survived your trials. And yet you deny the blood on your hands because you claim it was the will of your God.”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>The women are still trembling but Margret is brave---or stupid---enough to yell defiantly:</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“The only way to save your soul is to repent! You are a witch and your dark powers will not save you forever.”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>Andromache steps forwards, swinging the hatchet at her side as she walks, and the women skitter backwards fearfully. Florence has retrieved a rosary from her pocket and is praying frantically. Andromache sneers:</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“Do you really think he’s listening?”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>Margret grips the rosary as well, holding it along with Florence, and says:</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“I know God will save our souls.”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>Andromache asks honestly:</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“What makes you think he’s on your side? You, who sent countless innocent women to their deaths in witch trials you knew they wouldn’t survive. The only way to prove their innocence was to die, and that doesn’t do them much good, does it?”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>Margret starts to speak again but Andromache cuts her off sharply:</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>“I will give the same mercy you granted them. If God saves you, he’ll stop my hatchet. He’ll make you a miracle and smite me down before I can strike you.”</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>The women scramble as if they could somehow escape, but Andromache is as inevitable as a landslide. </span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>She cuts them down quickly and cleanly, barely giving them a chance to scream. Once the deed is done, Andromache crouches and wipes off the hatchet’s blade on one of their white skirts.  Then she looks up slowly, towards the sky she can’t see because of the roof, and waits for the lighting of God’s judgment to strike her.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>No such sign comes. Andromache is left there with the dead bodies and her aching self, still alive, still struggling to survive.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>There comes a slight sound from the closed door on the other side of the room. Andromache rises and moves to the door with a silent couple of strides. She opens it, ready to strike, only to find a child huddled in the connecting room.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>He stares up at her with wide, tear-filled eyes. She can’t tell children’s age very well, but he’s old enough to be reasonably smart, and to know what happened to his older sisters in the other room. She considers him, thinking of the children who had watched the trials, watched the witches die.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>For a moment, Andromache raises the hatchet to kill him too.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>But then, in a flash, she sees herself. A woman covered in blood and dirt, her hair long and as ragged as the dress she’s wearing. The hatchet in her hand, a tool used to chop wood to build fires and houses, turned to a murder weapon in her grasp. The grief clear in her face, drowning her as surely as Quynh is drowning in that iron maiden. She sees herself as what they had turned her into: an animal, a creature that lives only for revenge and killing, and knows nothing of what makes someone truly human. No love, no kindness, no joy, remains in her anymore.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>In that moment, even filled with the horror of knowing Quynh is somewhere without her, drowning eternally in an undying death, she wants to be better. She doesn’t want to be what they made her. She wants to do what her and Quynh had been trying to do by freeing the witches: she wants to make the world a better place. So she stumbles away from the child, leaving him terrified but unharmed. She crosses the room that is filled with the bodies of the women, her bare feet dragging across the rough wood floor. She takes a seat on the top stair of the ruined house’s stairway and tries to breathe deeply. </span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>After a long moment of simply trying not to cry, she raises the hatchet again. This time she takes it to the long strands of her mangled hair, awkwardly sawing at it until she’s hacked it down to a length barely long enough to hang in her face. She drops the hatchet, finally, and runs her bloody hands through the short hair remaining. It’s still matted and now filled with drying blood, but it feels better, like she’s cut off all the weight she came out of that cell carrying.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>She rises, leaving the hatchet behind, and finds a stable at the edge of the town. The smoke from the fires is gone, so she assumes they have managed to stop the flames from spreading. Most of the town has been saved. That fire had taken her only hope of finding Quynh, but it had also given her the time to get out of the town before the men regrouped. Not an equal trade, not by any means, but she’ll take what she can get. She carefully walks a beautiful bay mare out of the stable and covers her in her tack. The horse is unbothered by the blood on Andromache’s hands, snuffling gently at her skin without a hint of concern. Andromache gives her a couple friendly pats on the neck before throwing a leg over and pulling herself up into the saddle.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>The mare canters happily out of town, leaving the carnage behind.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>-------------</span>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I know some people have beliefs against killing unarmed people, so having andy kill margret and florence, despite them totally deserving it, I think andy would consider that a rather unmoral choice and that's why I had her feeling like maybe god would punish her</p>
<p>When I was writing this I just couldn't imagine andy killing a child ever, even at her lowest, so it seemed like a good point to turn from murderous revenge to living life beyond that</p>
<p>I also had andy cut her hair bc honestly my first trauma response is to shave my hair off. I also think that maybe the long hair would remind her of the whole witch trials experience and that's why she keeps it short. but maybe I'm just projecting lol</p></blockquote></div></div>
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